


Past Imperfect

by masswisteria



Category: Overwatch (Video Game)
Genre: And she has Opinions, Angela is a freaking genius, Canon-Typical Violence, F/F, Implied/Referenced Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Pharmercy eventually but it'll take a little while, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Regrets I've had a few, Survivor Guilt
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-07-31
Updated: 2017-03-20
Packaged: 2018-07-28 11:17:15
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 7
Words: 19,440
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7637923
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/masswisteria/pseuds/masswisteria
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Six years later, Doctor Angela Ziegler is still haunted by her time at Overwatch. How is it possible for it to simultaneously feel like the best and worst part of her life? Now, a sudden reunion presents her with an opportunity. But is it a chance at redemption or will it only lead to repeating the mistakes of the past? She compromised on her principles once before; can she really be what Jack and the others need her to be?</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> For now this is mostly canon-compliant, but that may change depending on what new tidbits of backstory Blizzard puts out. I know where this is going, let's see how long it takes to get there...
> 
> Translations for non-English text are available on hover and in the Author's Notes at the end of each chapter.

Angela easily slipped past the security measures that allegedly protected Watchpoint: Gibraltar from would-be looters. To be fair, most looters don’t have the Valkyrie suit; its flight capability made the twenty foot razor wire fence somewhat less imposing. She double checked that her staff and pack were still secure after the quick hop, then made her way quietly through the courtyard and past the outbuildings. Even in the middle of the night she knew the route well, having spent years of her life on this base. Though it was strange, seeing the place dark and abandoned like this. Angela could not remember a time when it hadn’t been bustling with activity. Even in the middle of the night, there had always been crews working to prep vehicles and payloads in time to make their launch windows. The silence of the base now was unsettling.

She reached the old barracks and listened for a moment for any signs of life. The place should be all but deserted, but Angela hadn’t survived a decade in war zones by not being careful. Sure enough, everything was quiet, so she cracked open the door and darted inside. She was halfway down the corridor and to the stairwell, almost ready to relax, when a sudden blue streak shot towards her, materializing into form just in time to nearly knock Angela off her feet.

“Angie!” a familiar voice yelled.

“Mein Gott! Lena?!” Angela cried out, shocked that the young woman here at all, and doubly shocked to suddenly receive a hug that was nearly a tackle from her.

“The one and only! Who else would it be? You know another time traveling hotshot?” she replied with a grin, arms still wrapped around Angela. Lena squeezed her tightly again. “Oh it’s _good_ to see you, Angie! It’s been ages!”

Angela’s brain finally caught up with events, and she returned the hug gladly. “It is good to see you too, Lena. It has been too long.” She tried to recall the last time she _had_ seen her. The last time she could think of was over five years ago in Zürich, but it couldn’t have been that long, could it? When had she last seen any of the others, for that matter? Possibly during the hearings. “But what are you doing here? Did Winston call you in as well?”

“What, don’t you know? ‘Recall!’ He called everyone in!” Her grin grew even wider, evidently very excited about this development.

“Wha- everyone? What do you mean?”

“Well not everyone everyone. Just the higher level agents. Some are still on their way. Oh! And you’re never gonna believe- oh just c’mon, follow me, I’ll show ya!” She took Angela’s hand and practically dragged her down the hall, taking a different path from what she expected. Lena talked the whole way, and Angela caught perhaps a third of what she said; she was not used to operating at ‘Tracer speed’ anymore. Abruptly they stopped in front of a secure door. Lena punched a code into the keypad - at least, Angela thought that’s what that impossible blur of motion was - and the door slid open, revealing a dusty briefing room and a sight she had not expected to ever see again.

Scattered around the room were several of Overwatch's finest. Perhaps it was hypocritical for her to condemn her former organization and still think of them that way, but she _knew_ these people. She had worked with them, fought alongside them. Torbjörn. Reinhardt. Jesse. And of course Winston, at the front of the room. Whatever may have happened with the agency, she could not help but think well of them. The group turned towards the door at the sound of Angela’s entrance, and erupted into excitement when they saw her standing there, mouth agape.

Jesse was the first to reach her, and he pulled her into a hug. “You wanna close your mouth before you catch a fly, doc,” Jesse said, smirking beneath his hat.

Angela couldn’t help but smile. “Thanks for the suggestion. It’s nice to see you too, Jesse. Why are you here? What is going on?”

Before he could answer her, she was grabbed from behind. “Angela!” an unmistakable voice boomed. “Wir haben uns so lange nicht mehr gesehen! Wie geht es dir?”

“Ach, Reinhardt!” Angela laughed as the older but evidently still strong man lifted her off the ground and spun her around. “Lass mich runter, Bitte!”

“Hey, where’s ‘the Soldier?’” Lena asked Winston. Angela had no idea who she was referring to, but her air quotes and sarcasm suggested exactly what Lena thought of their nickname.

“He left to do a perimeter check. He should be back in a few minutes.”

Angela sighed as Reinhardt set her down gently, slightly out of breath. She heard Torbjörn call across the room from where he sat, “Now, don’t go thinking I’m not glad to see you just cause I’m not picking you up and twirling you about like a ragdoll!”

Angela turned his way, and sure enough he had a familiar twinkle in his eye despite the surly tone. She gave him a wave and a smile. “Nice to see you too, Torbjörn.” She turned to include the rest of the room. “Now, could someone please tell me what on Earth is going on?”

Jesse answered first. “Ain’t it obvious? Winston here’s getting the band back together.”

Angela’s smile slipped from her lips. “He’s what?”

Winston cleared his throat, the deep bass rumble drawing everyone’s attention. “While that is not how I would have put it, Jesse is basically correct.” With all eyes on him, he went on, quickly taking the air of someone reciting a well-rehearsed speech. “Ever since Overwatch was disbanded, the world has been slowly falling apart at the seams.”

“Ya, not so slowly lately,” Torbjörn interjected.

Winston continued. “Quite right. Surely you have been keeping up with events. Mondatta’s assassination. The seeds of a second Omnic Crisis growing in Russia, and the accompanying uptick in anti-Omnic attacks around the world. It is all too much. Too many nations’ governments remain too weak to handle ordinary crises, let alone what we are seeing now. And the UN is too paralyzed to act, as usual. But someone has to. _We_ have to.”

“So what, we’re going to gather up a bunch of old heroes and go out and save the day, is that it?” She gazed around the room, addressing everyone. “Because the solution to dozens of different groups fighting one another is to add one more into the mix?”

Winston frowned. “Angela, you know Overwatch was-”

“Overwatch is dead!” Angela cut him off. “ _I_ killed it.”

“Nah, a bunch of bureaucrats were the ones what did that,” Jesse said.

“They may have pulled the trigger, but it was my testimony that loaded the gun. And I had good reason to do so!” Angela balled her fists at her sides, suppressing the urge to hammer her point out on a metal tabletop. “No matter how many former agents you gather, no matter which Watchpoint you squat within, you will not bring Overwatch back.”

Jesse shifted uncomfortably before meeting her eyes and speaking. “You know, I never thought Overwatch was about the people or the places, Doc.”

Winston spoke again, Jesse’s words rekindling his excitement. “Yes, that’s right! Overwatch was about the dream of peace, and hope for a better tomorrow, and working to make it so. So many in the world today are fighting for land, or money, or power, no one is fighting for peace.”

Angela’s laugh echoed loudly in the room. She could not believe she was going through this again, as if she had somehow contracted Lena’s disability and was falling backwards through time. It took a moment for her to regain her composure and speak. “‘Fighting for peace.’ ‘ _Fighting_...for peace.’ Oh I am _sorry_ Winston, but I have heard that one before, and I am not falling for it again. I have lost too many friends, too many opportunities, and too many years of my life searching for the end of that particular rainbow.”

“You been eating barbed wire, girl?” Torbjörn asked. “You know damn well we all got hurt by what happened. But look at the world today! We can’t just sit around twiddling our thumbs while everything goes to hell in a handbasket!”

“You are absolutely right.” Angela’s tone grew sharper as she spoke, and anger flashed in her eyes. “In fact, not all of us were just ‘sitting around.’ You do realize that I was in the field, working? I was out there saving lives. There are people dying, right now, because I am not there to heal them! All because you all want to play at being heroes again.”

Lena scowled at her words. “Oi, don’t act like you’re the only one out there trying to do some good! You know bloody well we’ve all been trying, in our own way. But we were always stronger together.”

Winston sighed. “It’s true, there are many places where each of us - and you in particular, Angela - can make a difference. No matter how and where you decide to spend your efforts, some necessarily go without. If only we had a thousand, no a million, like you. But we don’t. And Overwatch...it was a force multiplier. You kept us going through our missions, and together we helped millions when individually we could only help a few. We can do that again. You have to think of the big picture-”

“No!” Angela slammed her fist against the wall, shaking an unsettling amount of dust and debris loose from the ceiling. “That was exactly the problem! Too much looking at the big picture and not enough paying attention to the people that were being trampled right beneath us! Not noticing the collateral damage, forgetting to question whether the ends justified the means. That’s what happens when you go to war in the name of peace. No, I won’t - I _can’t_ be a part of that again.”

Reinhardt spoke up, sounding wounded. “You had these same concerns before you first joined Overwatch, as I recall. I thought you had reconciled this in your mind. What happened to that?”

Sure as she was in her convictions, she hated to see him look so hurt. “What happened? I was proven right,” she answered sadly. “Please, all of you, just let it go. Move on.” Angela turned on her heel to leave.

“What, like you did?” Lena’s comment froze Angela with her hand on the door handle. Something dropped into the pit of her stomach at her words. Angela looked back over her shoulder at Lena. Lena stared back, hands on her hips waiting for a response.

“Excuse me?”

“You said we should move on. Why don’t you tell us how that’s working out for you?”

Angela’s anger all but evaporated, replaced with a growing tension gnawing at her insides. She forced her expression as still as she could make it and met Lena’s stare before answering. “It is working out perfectly fine, thanks.”

“Is that so?”

“Yes,” Angela answered, fighting down the urge to swallow. Lena looked as though she wanted to say something more, but she held it back, whatever it was. Angela let out a breath she hadn’t realized she was holding, turned back to the door, and opened it. She froze.

Jack Morrison was standing in front of her. Jack Morrison, a man dead six years now. _This is impossible_.

“Hello, Angela,” Jack said.

“Jack,” she whispered, her hand raised to her mouth in shock. “Y-you’re _alive_?”

“Let’s talk about that later.”

“But...we _buried_ you.”

“I said ‘Later.’” He stepped past her and addressed the room. Angela turned to follow him as he went, still staring disbelievingly. “Mercy...Dr. Ziegler...is right.” From the outburst from the others, Angela guessed that was not what they expected him to say. Half a dozen different voices were yelling on top of one another, but the room quickly fell silent under the old commander’s stare.

“She. Is. Right,” he repeated, emphasizing each word. “Overwatch lost its way. The good that we achieved does not make up for or excuse the harm done by Blackwatch.”

Oh, if only Blackwatch had been the only problem. “Don’t try to blame this all on Gabriel. You were _his_ commander just as you were ours, Jack, and you turned a blind eye to more than a few of Blackwatch’s transgressions.” Some of Angela’s earlier anger was back, but her voice had lost most of its edge. This was her former commander - who apparently had been alive all these years! - she was speaking to, and old habits die hard.

Jack turned to face her, and Angela forced herself not to wilt under his piercing gaze. After a moment that seemed to her to stretch on forever, he said, “Right again, Doctor. We… _I_ made mistakes.” That was a sentence she never expected to hear from Jack Morrison, nevermind the fact that he was _supposed to be dead_.

“Mistakes like pretending to be dead?” Angela spat.

He ignored her comment and continued. “I don’t intend to make those mistakes again. That’s why we need you.”

Angela stared back at him, waiting for him to continue, uncertain where this was going.

“Overwatch needed a conscience. Someone who could say ‘enough is enough’, and pull us back when we needed it. You tried to play that role. But we - Gabe, Ana, and I - we didn’t let you. This time I will.” Jack fell silent, apparently finished. He stood in front of her, impassive as always, seeming unchanged by the intervening years, despite the scars that now crisscrossed his face.

Angela waited to see if he would continue, but he did not. “You’re going to have to do better than that,” she sighed.

Jack cracked a bit of a smile. “I know. But it’s late, and you no doubt had a long day of travel. Let’s all get some rest and we can pick this up in the morning.”

“We’ve cleaned up some of the basement barracks. There’s a room for you there, if you want it,” Winston added.

Angela was considering the offer when her thoughts were interrupted by a computerized voice on the intercom. “Warning! Intrusion detected along the western perimeter,” it announced.

“Hey, didn’t _someone_ just finish checking that perimeter?” Jesse asked, his voice dripping with feigned innocence.

“Yeah, hell of a job there, Jack,” Lena quipped.

“Quiet, both of you.” Jack’s seriousness wiped the smirks from their faces. “How many, Athena?” Jack asked.

“It appears to be a single intruder, moving on foot.”

He looked Angela’s way, but she shook her head. She had come alone. “Location? Vector?” he asked.

“The intruder is 50 meters out from the main courtyard, approaching from the west.”

Jack nodded. “Tracer, McCree, go see to our ‘guest.’”

“Yes, sir,” they each said, already checking their respective weapons. Tracer zipped out the door and down the hall and McCree hurried after.

“Athena, keep us apprised of the situation,” Jack ordered.

 

Lena flashed a hand signal at Jesse, and he nodded. He took up position guarding the entrance into the barracks, and prepared to wait while she flanked their target. From this point he had a clear view of the courtyard, just in case Lena needed backup. As if. Lena for her part took off down the corridor and out the side exit, avoiding teleporting until she was safely obscured by the other buildings. Nothing like a bright blue flash in the middle of a dark courtyard to cock up a sneak attack. Or a bright white flash, for that matter. She double-checked to make sure her coat was still covering her chrono accelerator.

Lena swung wide to the south, around their target who should be just approaching the western edge of the courtyard now. Lena could feel her heart rate pick up in anticipation. She always loved this part of the mission - the sneaking and stalking. Dangerous though it was, she couldn’t help but think of it as a game, like playing Hide and Seek with her brothers in the park. _Except, you know, with more guns._

A few quick hops brought her around to where she wanted to be, behind a warehouse just off the courtyard, about 20 meters from the target’s expected location. She carefully peeked around the corner, and… _shit, where did they go?!_ Lena quickly scanned the area, looking for any sign of them, a flicker of movement, a stray reflection, anything.

There. Across the courtyard. The target was standing there, inside an entryway, looking toward the barracks. The slightest motion. An arm reaching back...to draw a gun, _shit!_

She was there in a flash - well, three flashes but who’s counting? - with one hand on the target’s wrist, the other holding a pistol to the back of their head. “Let’s just leave that right where it is, eh luv?” She said, rather more cheerily than she felt. “I got ‘em, Eastwood.” The target tensed, and Lena pressed the barrel of her gun hard against their skull and yanked their arm up behind their back. They gave a very satisfying grunt. “Oi, behave!”

Jesse ran up to them and drew his gun on the intruder, allowing Lena to holster her own and zip tie their arms behind their back. “Eastwood?’” he asked her.

“I told you, if you’re not gonna pick a callsign, I’m just gonna keep making them up.” Lena said with a grin, as she finished binding their prisoner. “There. Now let’s see what we’ve got here.” She yanked the intruder’s arm to turn them to face her, then pulled her coat aside, instantly bathing them in warm, white light.

Tracer blinked a few times to adjust her eyes, then a few more times in disbelief once she could see clearly. “ _Ho...ly...shit._ ”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> #### Translations:
> 
> _Mein Gott!_
>      (German) My God!
> _Wir haben uns so lange nicht mehr gesehen! Wie geht es dir?_
>      (German) It’s been so long since I’ve seen you! How are you?
> _Ach, Reinhardt! Lass mich runter, Bitte!_
>      (German) Oh, Reinhardt! Put me down, please!
> 
> I am not a native German speaker nor have I ever studied it, so feel free to correct me if I've gotten anything horribly wrong!


	2. Chapter 2

Angela watched Jack out of the corner of her eye, still not quite believing that he wasn't some figment of her imagination. The shock was gradually fading, however, with a mix of emotions rising to take its place. The tension in the room had been growing ever since Jack ordered everyone quiet while they awaited news from Lena and Jesse, and that was not helping her mood either. How could he have abandoned all of them like this? For _six years!_ And why? They deserved answers. But Jack was refusing to talk about it at the moment and Angela knew from experience just how futile arguing with him about it would be, so she would wait. She did not have to like it though.

Abruptly Jack straightened from his position leaning against the wall, his hand going to his ear. "I read you. Report," he said. Angela rolled her eyes. Of _course_ he has a private comm link. She watched him converse with whoever it was on the other end. “Huh, interesting...Alright, bring them in.” With that he turned to the rest of the room.

“Tracer and McCree are coming down with the intruder. We'll deal with them when they get here.” And apparently that was all the explanation they were going to get.

Several more minutes of awkward silence passed before Angela heard the tell tale beeps of a keypad outside the door. The door slid open and Jesse and Lena entered single-file, their prisoner standing between them. Gasps of recognition echoed around the room as they saw her. She picked out Jack as the leader and addressed him in lightly accented English. “My name is Fareeha Amari. You will tell me what happened to my mother.”

 

There was no doubting the woman's claim; she was the spitting image of her mother, tall and muscular, dressed in fatigues and worn but well cared for combat boots, Eye of Horus tattoo under one eye - though it was her right instead of her left. Even her commanding presence reminded Angela of Ana. She had never seen a captive exude such calm and determination. No, that was wrong. Even bound as she was, Fareeha was no captive.

“Untie her,” Jack ordered, as if to underline Angela's thought. Lena quickly cut loose Fareeha's bindings, and she folded her arms in front of her. Angela noticed then the cybernetic limb replacing her left arm from just above the elbow down. She could tell from her regrettably extensive experience with prosthetics that it was exceptionally well made.

Jack held out his hand in greeting. “John Morrison.”

“I know who you are.” Fareeha made no move to shake his hand.

“Do you now. Good.” He let his hand fall to his side and turned to the rest of the group. “As I was saying, prior to the arrival of our newest guest, it's late and some of us have had a long day already.” He nodded in Angela's direction. He was right, the trip from Mosul to Gibraltar had been a long one. She fought back a yawn at the reminder. “So let's all hit the sack and we can pick these conversations back up in the morning.”

“I want an answer to my question,” Fareeha demanded.

“In the morning.” Jack walked past her to the door.

“I don't need rest.”

“Well I do, so I'm going to bed. Since you're Ana's daughter, you're welcome to bunk here. Reinhardt there can show you to a room. Or you can stay up and talk to yourself if you want. If neither of those options appeal to you…well you found your way in, I'm sure you can find your way back out.” With that he was out the door, leaving behind a decidedly uncomfortable atmosphere.

Angela was impressed. It had been a long while since she had seen Jack Morrison so thoroughly take control of a situation. Whatever upper hand Fareeha might have had with her surprise arrival was surely gone now, and she wouldn't be getting it back. Fareeha for her part was furious, though she hid it well. The others may not have noticed, but Angela had become something of an expert at reading Ana Amari, and apparently her daughter inherited her tells.

Lena broke the awkward silence with a yawn that was exaggerated even for her. “I don't know about the rest of you but I think the commander's got the right idea. I'm positively knackered.”

Reinhardt agreed. “Yes, how about it, Miss Amari-”

“It's ‘Captain,’” she said flatly.

“Ah, excuse me, Captain Amari. How about it? Shall I show you to your quarters?”

“Please.” Her voice was flat, emotionless, but her index finger tapped rapidly against her thigh as she followed him out of the room. Oh yes, she was _pissed_.

“Excellent! You know I knew your mother quite well, she was always talking about you…” Reinhardt's voice trailed off as they disappeared down the corridor.

Angela turned to Winston. “Winston, would you mind showing me to that room you mentioned? I think I've had enough excitement for one night.”

 

Angela sighed as she stared up at the familiar concrete ceiling, familiar despite her having never set foot in this particular room. She had spent plenty of nights in ones just like it in Overwatch facilities all over the globe, including one a few floors up in this very Watchpoint. That room had been hers for what, six, seven years? This one or that, they were all the same. Nondescript, utilitarian construction. A six sided box of plain, unpainted, concrete. Cheap to build, easy to maintain, but terribly boring to look at when lying in bed unable to fall asleep. It was over an hour ago when she traded her flight suit for a cotton tank and shorts from her pack and attempted to get to sleep. She knew how unlikely that was, but she didn’t have anything better to do. She had never had an easy time falling asleep - unless she was on shift, or in the field (which was rather like being on shift 24/7). There, her body had learned to catch whatever sleep it could wherever and whenever it could. But at home or on base - _weren't they once the same thing?_ \- was a different story. She would toss and turn on the best of nights, and if she had something on her mind… Angela had long ago lost count of the number of all nighters she had pulled simply because she couldn't shut her brain off. She had a feeling this was going to be one of those nights. She certainly had plenty on her mind.

Her earlier fury had subsided, and for that she was grateful. Giving in to her knee-jerk emotional reactions like that rarely served her well, satisfying though it may have felt at the time. It usually ended in embarrassed backpedaling and apologies to all involved, though she did not think that would happen in this case. Her feelings on the matter had not changed; reviving Overwatch - with or without official recognition - was an awful idea. But she was not going to get anywhere with the others by chastising them like a disappointed mother. And with Jack apparently alive and in top form, she needed to keep a rational head about her.

Jack Morrison, alive and well. It was almost enough to rekindle hope that Ana _was_ still out there, somewhere, but she knew just how unlikely that was. There were only three real possibilities: she was dead, she had gone into hiding like Jack, or she had been captured. Angela knew Ana would have preferred death to the third option, even opted for it if she had the choice, given how it turned out for Amélie. And she couldn't imagine the Ana she had known walking away from her responsibilities. Or her daughter. That really only left the first option. Angela sighed. Jack. Gabriel. Ana. Even if they _were_ all here, it would make no difference. All of them, Angela included, had demonstrated that they were unfit for the responsibility placed upon them by the world. And themselves. No, in the end Jack being alive didn’t change things in her mind.

A knock at her door shook her from her thoughts. She considered ignoring it. It was late and she should be sleeping. It came again. With an irritated frown she stood up, sweeping her hair back behind her shoulders as she did so. The floor was cold against her bare feet as she crossed the room and opened the door. It was Jack, standing there waiting for her, a pair of mugs in his hands.

She slapped him.

It happened before she even realized she was doing it. She gasped when her brain caught up with the rest of her. “Scheisse! I'm sorry Jack, I…”

Jack rubbed at his jaw, frowning slightly. “Did you get that out of your system?”

Angela nodded.

“Feel better?”

“Yes, actually.” She felt a bit childish for it, but it was true.

“Good. Mind if I come in?”

Angela eyed him curiously. “It’s rather late for a social call, isn’t it? Didn’t you suggest we all get some sleep?”

“Were you sleeping?”

“No,” she admitted.

“Then I’m not interrupting anything.”

She could have said no. But she knew perfectly well that she wasn't going to get to sleep any time soon, and talking with Jack would be infinitely more productive than running her mind in circles over the same thoughts all night. She stepped back from the door, gesturing for him to enter.

He flashed her a smile as he did so, and went straight to the small table in the room. He took one of the two chairs and set the mugs down, sliding one towards the other chair. “A peace offering,” he explained.

“I did not know we were at war.” Angela grabbed her lighter and cigarettes from the bedside before joining Jack at the table.

“I thought you quit,” he said as she lit the cigarette between her lips.

“I thought you were dead.”

“Touché.”

She took a long drag, held the smoke in before exhaling slowly, willing the nicotine to take the edge off her mood. “I did quit. And then Ana disappeared, and then you and Gabriel were killed, and I was the only one left to defend Overwatch from accusations I increasingly was forced to agree with.”

“You weren’t the only one left.”

“Oh? Let’s go over it, shall we? Of the senior leaders, half were missing and presumed dead.” Angela ticked people off on her fingers as she went, one, two, three down. “The committee knew Torbjörn never poked his head out of his shop long enough to see what was going on outside of R&D.” She raised voice as she went on. “And they weren’t about to interview Winston, when most of them thought he belonged in a laboratory - as a specimen! So was I the _only_ one left? No, not technically. But I may as well have been!” She was shouting by the end of it.  Gottverdammt. She usually had better control of herself than this. She took another drag and blew it out, followed it with several slow breaths. “I’m sorry, Jack...I am happy to see you alive and well, I really am, but what happened to you? Where have you been for the last six years?”

Jack stayed silent for a bit, whether deciding how to answer or if he would answer, Angela wasn’t sure. Finally, he spoke. “At first? Protocol. When someone is trying to kill you, let them think they've succeeded. I hadn't intended to stay under...but then the investigations started, and you know the mess that turned into. If I'd come back in the middle of that it just would've made things worse. And after a while, it was easier to just stay dead, clean up as many of our messes as I could on my own.”

“It sounds like you were looking for an excuse to remain hidden,” Angela said, not trying to hide the bitterness she felt.

To her surprise, he nodded. “Maybe I was.”

She took a sip from her mug - old peppermint tea, years past its ‘use by’ date. Probably from a box she had left in the kitchen herself. “So why come back now?”

“Winston was right about some things. It is getting worse out there. But,” he pulled a comm tablet out and tapped at it a few times, “primarily it’s this.” He set the tablet down so Angela could see the screen. It showed a figure wearing a mask and a flowing black coat, wielding a pair of guns. She recognized it as a still from footage of the Numbani museum attack.

“Gabriel.” Angela did not like where this was going.

Jack put the tablet away. “You picked up on that. Good. Then you know why I need you on board.” Angela puffed at her cigarette. It had been obvious to her who it was as soon as she saw the full video online. The distortions, the way he moved - not to mention his fighting style - made it clear to her. But that raised the question of how Jack came to the same conclusion, and how much he knew.

“I am afraid I don’t know what you mean.” It had never been easy to lie to Jack. Angela was a little proud she managed to do so without stuttering.

“I know about the procedure.”

Well. One question answered, another raised. “How? I was quite certain that I left no record of it.” She had erased everything, thoroughly. She had purged all knowledge of it from Athena’s memory banks, wiped the local backups, cloud backups, archival storage, lest anyone stumble upon it and decide to replicate her work.

Jack smirked at that. “I _was_ the head of Overwatch. You really think I didn’t have ways to find out what was going on in my labs?”

“Even posthumously, apparently,” Angela added dryly. “Yes, I am responsible for his current condition. You must think that I therefore have some idea of how to catch him. I am afraid I must disappoint you.” She ended with a frustrated sigh. Her two-fold failure to help Reyes still ate at her. Angela stubbed out her finished cigarette on her saucer and lit another.

Jack leaned back in his chair. “Oh I don’t expect that you have a solution just waiting in the wings. But I do expect that you’ll find one. And a lot faster than anyone else would.”

Angela recognized that as a compliment, but it was a difficult one to appreciate. She moved to the next logical question “Why bring back Overwatch for that? You would have had better luck recruiting my help if you had just come to me directly. You must’ve known that.”

Jack leaned forward over the table. “If it were just Gabriel, then I would’ve kept this between ourselves. But it’s not. It’s also the sniper who was with him.” His careful avoidance of her name did nothing to prevent the sudden pang of guilt Angela felt. “And the rest of Talon. All products of our mistakes, and too big for just the two of us to handle. Apparently too big for a lot of governments to handle.”

Angela let out a deep sigh. He was right, as usual. It grated on her, also as usual. Jack had once been one of her closest friends, but it had always been annoying how often his supreme confidence ended up being justified. Regardless, she couldn’t deny the growing sense of responsibility telling her what to do. Gabriel was her responsibility. Amélie too, if not quite as directly. It didn’t make her happy, but it had been a long time since any of her choices had. She slumped back in her chair, defeated, staring into the cup in her hands. “How did we get here, Jack? How did we let it end up this way?”

“Hubris. Mine, Yours. Gabe’s.”

She had already known the answer, having pondered it herself in the small hours of the night more times than she’d care to remember. But it was oddly comforting hearing Jack echo her own conclusion. “I _want_ to help you bring in Gabriel and Amélie. If it were just the two of us, that would be one thing, but this?” She gestured all around her. “This Overwatch reborn? I can’t do this again.”

“Angela…”

“The fallout from last time nearly killed me,” she admitted. “I do not think I could survive that twice.” She hoped that was enough to make him understand.

“Give me six months. Six months, and then you’re out.”

Angela took a drag off her cigarette as she considered his proposal. “I can give you three, God help me.”

“That’ll do,” he said, as if there had never been a doubt in his mind about where they would end up. Knowing Jack, there probably hadn’t.

Angela slumped back in her chair, emotionally exhausted by the discussion. “So much for waiting until morning.”

“Athena, what time is it?” Jack asked.

“The time is oh one thirty seven,” Athena answered.

“There, see? It’s morning.”

Angela rolled her eyes. “How did you know I’d be awake, anyway?” She thought a moment. “Please don’t tell me that the former head of Overwatch has ways of knowing what’s going on in the dorms as well?”

Jack laughed, full and loud and God, Angela hadn’t realized how much she had missed that sound. They’d had their arguments, to be sure, but he had always been such a positive presence on base, and it had been a long time since she had been around anyone she considered a good friend.

“No, no,” Jack answered. “I just remember that you never could get to sleep when you had something on your mind. Didn’t matter if it was research, or personal...or political. The only one who could ever get you to drop something and go to sleep was Ana.” Angela smiled at the reminiscence. “Though you woke up half the Watchpoint in the process,” Jack finished with a wink and a smirk.

Angela felt her face go beet red. “You-! That was one time!” Jack laughed again, and eventually Angela joined him. “I don't recall you finding it quite so funny at the time.”

“Oh I thought it was hilarious. I just wasn’t going to let _you_ know that,” he said with a grin. “Ana, on the other hand…we gave her shit for months over that.” He chuckled.

“How easily we fall back into old patterns,” Angela sighed. “I tried to tell myself that I didn’t miss this, you know. Seeing everyone. Talking with you.”

“I know what you mean,” he said, and that was probably the most sincere smile she had ever seen from Jack Morrison.

Another topic came to Angela’s mind. “What do you plan to do about Fareeha?”

“Tell her what I know about her mother and offer her a job,” Jack said as though it were the most obvious answer in the world.

Angela shook her head, a soft smile on her lips. “Ana would murder you if she were here right now.”

Jack shrugged. “Well, she’s not. And if Fareeha at all takes after her, she’ll be an asset in the field.” He sipped his tea. “Besides, if she’s trying to track down what happened to her mother, better she do that with us then on her own. She’ll just get in the way otherwise.” Angela nodded, then yawned. Jack rose to his feet. “I think that’s my cue. We’ll talk more in the morning - the _real_ morning,” he added with a grin. Angela followed him to the door. He clapped a hand on her shoulder and said, “Now try to actually get some sleep. We've got some long days ahead of us.”

“Yes sir,” Angela said, smiling. It was equal parts comforting and frightening how easily those words left her lips. Her smiled faded after shutting the door behind Jack. She thought she made the right decision tonight. But then, she had thought that before.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yup, Angela's a smoker. Nope, she does not always make good life choices.
> 
> #### Translations
> 
> _Scheisse!_
>      (German) Shit!
> _Gottverdammt!_
>      (German) God damn it!


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Many thanks to my wonderful, wonderful beta, [anyilherron](http://anyilherron.tumblr.com)! <3

Angela yawned as she stepped out of the elevator. She had tried to follow Jack’s advice, but only managed a couple of hours of sleep before her brain decided it was time to be up and about. After almost twenty minutes of digging around in the mess hall she accepted that instant coffee and a seven year old MRE were the best she was going to find for breakfast. She carried a mug of the former with her; the latter she decided was best left alone. Angela hit the button to open the metal security gate and it slid upward, opening onto Watchpoint: Gibraltar’s observation platform. Where Fareeha Amari was standing, her eyes on the opening door, and Angela.

She offered Fareeha what she hoped was a disarming smile. “Good morning. I am surprised to find anyone up here.” She crossed the platform and joined her at the railing.

Fareeha shifted toward the door. “I could leave if…”

“No! No, it’s perfectly alright. The surprise is not unpleasant.” Fareeha still looked as though she were deciding whether to stay or go. “Please, stay. I would welcome the company.”

At that Fareeha nodded and relaxed somewhat. “I did not get the chance to introduce myself last night. Angela Ziegler.” She held out her hand in greeting.

“Fareeha Amari,” she said, shaking Angela’s hand. “But I suppose you already knew that.” She returned to the railing, and the two of them looked out at the water. From the platform they could see for miles across the deep blue of the Alboran Sea. The Moroccan coast was a faint, gray strip along the southern horizon, just becoming visible in the morning sun.

Angela spoke. “I never could get enough of this view. I used to always take my morning coffee up here, whenever the weather allowed for it.”

“It is spectacular. Better than I had ever imagined, from hearing my mother describe it.”

Angela sipped at her coffee and nodded, recalling the countless hours the two had spent up there, enjoying the view together. “Ana always loved it here.”

Fareeha half-turned toward Angela, a considering look on her face. “You and my mother were close.” Not quite a statement, not quite a question.

Angela considered how to respond. She wondered how much Ana had told her daughter, and whether it was too early in the morning to have the ‘yes, I slept with your mother’ conversation. She decided to play it safe. “Yes, we were, for a time.”

Fareeha nodded before turning back to look out over the sea. A minute passed by in silence before her eyes suddenly widened in shock and she blurted out, “Ya lahwy, you two were _lovers!_ ”

Angela’s jaw nearly hit the floor. So much for playing it safe. “Now how in the _hell_ did you figure that out?!”

Fareeha had a deep, bright laugh, that Angela found enjoyable despite it coming at her expense. “I just put together some of the things she said about you, and reconsidered them with the benefit of an extra decade of maturity.” She smirked before adding, “The pink in your cheeks helped too.”

Angela set her coffee down so she could hide her face in her hands, and sighed. “Well. I suppose that cat is out of the bag. Yes, we...had a relationship. I apologize if that is more than you cared to know about your mother.”

“Well, I did come here to learn about her. I just didn’t expect to learn _that_.” She paused a moment before asking, “Were you two still, um...together?”

Angela shook her head. “No, no, that was all long ago, years before she...”

“Died,” Fareeha completed for her, matter-of-factly. Angela looked up, her surprise at Fareeha’s candidness plain on her face. “Please, it’s been almost seven years now. I accepted reality a long time ago.”

“So when you asked about her last night...”

Fareeha’s jaw was set, showing some of the fierce determination she exhibited the night before. “I just want to know what happened. I deserve that much.”

Angela nodded. “Of course.” They both fell silent, an awkward tension hanging in the air. Angela felt like she should say something to...console her? Cheer her up? But she had no idea what Fareeha needed right now. All Angela knew of her came from stories Ana had shared, and those were of a much younger Fareeha.

Fareeha solved the dilemma for her. “What was she like, when she was in Overwatch?” Fareeha asked, still looking out over the water.

Angela thought for a moment before answering. “She was...a force to be reckoned with, that’s for sure. And not just in the field. Surely she must have shared stories with you?”

“No. Never.” Fareeha laughed, but it was not the bright, cheerful laugh from earlier. “She didn’t want to glamorize being a soldier, didn’t want me to think about it at all, really. So all I got was the same PR vids as everyone else: ‘Ana Amari, Overwatch’s “Mama Bear,” looking out for her team and keeping them safe. Taking care of her people, on and off the battlefield.’”

Angela smiled. “There was a lot of truth to those, when it came to Ana. God help you if she decided you weren’t taking good care of yourself. She had no qualms about dragging soldiers out of bed and straight to the mess hall, or the infirmary, or the gym, depending on whatever it was she felt they were neglecting. Or marching them _into_ bed, as in my case.” The words left Angela’s mouth before she recognized the double entendre. Judging from Fareeha’s raised eyebrow, it had not escaped her notice.

“Now _that’s_ more than I wanted to know,” she said, laughing.

Angela felt herself blush from the tips of her ears on down. She tried to stammer out an explanation “I-I didn’t-, I meant-!”

“I know what you meant, Doctor Ziegler.” Fareeha laughed again, and this time Angela joined her. If her slip managed to bring a smile back to Fareeha’s face, then perhaps the embarrassment was worth it.

“Please, call me ‘Angela,’” she said, once she stopped laughing. “Around here, only Jack ever calls me ‘Doctor Ziegler,’ and even that’s only when he’s being ‘The Commander.’” Angela spoke the last two words in a mockingly serious voice that drew another laugh from Fareeha.

“I shall try to remember,” Fareeha said.

Thinking of Jack brought to Angela’s mind what he had told her the night before. She could picture how the conversation between Jack and Fareeha would go - Jack baiting the trap with hope for some kind of closure for her with Ana. She made a decision. “Fareeha...Jack is going to invite you to sign on with his team.”

Her eyes went wide and sparkled with glee. “He’s inviting me to join Overwatch?!”

“This is not Overwatch!” Fareeha frowned at the sharp rebuke, and Angela mentally cursed herself for losing her temper again. “I’m sorry…that came out harsher than I intended.” She settled herself and continued in what she hoped would remain a more moderate tone. “Still, it is true. This is not Overwatch. This is something new, and different, and decidedly more dangerous. It’s possible that we will all end up in prison over it.”

Angela’s words only succeeded in turning Fareeha’s frown to a glare. “You going to say I should refuse,” she said flatly. “But you said ‘we.’ Why should I listen to your advice when you didn’t listen to it yourself?”

Angela sighed. “I’m not going to tell you what you should do, you have to make that decision yourself. Just...just make sure you know what it is that you are signing up for.”

A mechanical whirr announced the arrival of the elevator, and drew both Angela’s and Fareeha’s eyes to the door behind them. Moments later, the security gate opened up and Jack stepped through. “Ah, good morning, Captain Amari.” He looked in Angela’s direction. “Good morning, Doctor. Jesse’s making some breakfast, if you’d care for something a little more filling than coffee.”

Angela caught the message: Jack wanted to talk to Fareeha alone. With one last concerned look at Fareeha, she made to leave. “That does sound like a good idea. All I found down there were rations that expired last decade, but I suppose I will see what he’s making.”

“I usually don’t ask,” Jack called back as the door slid shut behind her.

 

Fareeha watched Angela leave, still uncertain what to make of the unsolicited advice. On one hand, she’d had more than enough of ‘do as I say, not as I do’ from her mother. On the other hand, her mother had never been happy with Fareeha making decisions for herself. And she had the suspicion that everything the doctor had said was right. She eyed Commander Morrison, still irritated over being brushed off by him last night.

“What brought you to Gibraltar?” he asked after the door shut behind Doctor Ziegler.

“A plane,” Fareeha answered. It was childish she knew, but it still felt good, and she resented having to answer his questions right now. The commander simply stood there, clearly waiting for a real answer, and eventually she relented. “I received an invitation.”

He looked skeptical. “An invitation?”

“Of a sort. On my mother’s old comm link.”

“Ah. ‘Recall,’” he said, and Fareeha nodded.

“Along with coordinates for this Watchpoint. Satisfied?”

He drummed his fingers against the railing, apparently considering. “So you decided to go check it out. You didn’t think it might be a trap? Someone looking to get revenge on ex-Overwatch agents?”

Fareeha crossed her arms over her chest. “I didn’t exactly come knocking on the front door.” she answered testily. His only reply was a noncommittal grunt, and Fareeha decided she was done answering questions. “Now tell me what you know about my mother’s death. I know Overwatch performed an investigation.”

He stood there looking at her for a moment before reaching into his pocket and withdrawing a data card. “Here is everything Overwatch had on your mother’s last mission. Including the evidence and report from that investigation you know about.” He held the card out to her and she took it, trying to keep her surprise from her face. She had not expected him to hand anything over so easily.

“Don’t get too excited, there’s not a lot there that wasn’t public. It was a Talon ambush - we kept that name out of the news, but there was no doubt about it. Beyond that, we don’t know much. I think I know who does, though.”

Fareeha looked up from the memory card in her hand. “Who?”

“Gabriel Reyes.”

Fareeha raised an eyebrow. “He’s dead.”

“Yeah, dead like me.” He smirked.

She sighed. “I suppose you have a point. What does he have to do with this?”

“Reyes had been operating out of Watchpoint: Volgograd, tracking some activity out of one of the old Russian Omiums. Ana was on her way to there when she were ambushed. Officially, she was escorting new recruits to their first station. Unofficially, she was going to confront Reyes about some questionable Blackwatch activities.” 

Fareeha could piece the rest together from there. “You think she stumbled onto something incriminating, and Reyes killed her for it.”

“That’s one possibility.”

“Where is he now?”

He shook his head. “I don’t know. He’s been running with Talon, I know that much.” Talon. Fareeha recalled what she knew about the organization from Helix’s intel. It wasn’t much, but it was enough to know they represented a substantial threat. Morrison continued, seemingly guessing where her train of thought was going. “I also know that going after him on your own is a great way to shorten your lifespan.”

Fareeha closed her fist around the data card. “If he knows something…”

Jack turned to face the water, his hands on the railing. “Look...You might’ve noticed I’m putting a team together here. We’re going to bring in Reyes. And take down Talon. I’ve heard about your work for Helix.” He turned back to face her. “You’d be a welcome asset on our team.”

And there it was, what Doctor Ziegler had warned her about. “Your ‘team.’ I look around and I see ex-Overwatch agents, in an old Overwatch base...yet Doctor Ziegler made quite clear that this is not Overwatch. So what is it?”

Morrison smiled. “She said that did she? Well she’s not wrong...after all under the Petras act, that would be illegal. We can’t have that. No, we’re just another run-of-the-mill security contractor. We just happen to be very selective about our contracts.”

Fareeha considered what he said. It answered her question while telling her almost nothing. She would have to get specific. “You plan to operate within international law?”

He nodded. “I do.”

“And the contracts that you’ll be taking?”

“Only those that get us closer to Reyes and Talon,” he assured her.

They were good answers. They were the _right_ answers. And if Talon was to blame for her mother’s death, Fareeha needed to bring them to justice. And regardless of what the doctor and commander say, this was still an opportunity for Fareeha to work alongside her lifelong heroes. No, it wasn’t Overwatch, but it was a hell of a lot closer than she thought she would ever get, a day ago. There was really only one answer Fareeha could give. But another question occurred to her. “You mentioned my work for Helix - you do know I don’t have a suit? The Raptora armor belongs to Helix. I couldn’t exactly take one with me on leave.”

Jack shrugged. “Well I guess you’ll just be stuck on the ground walking with the rest of us grunts. It’s not too bad, you just put one foot in front of the other. I’m sure you’ll pick it up in no time,” he said with a smirk.

Fareeha rolled her eyes. “I _did_ serve in the infantry, you know.”

“Then we’ve got nothing to worry about.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> About 6400 words in, Angela and Fareeha finally get to talk to one another. Although it turned out to be a bit of a bumpy conversation...hopefully their next one will go more smoothly? :)
> 
> #### Translations:
> 
> _Ya lahwy (يا لهوي)_
>      (Egyptian Arabic) Oh wow/Oh my god/Oh no
> 
> Hey, guess what, I know even less Egyptian Arabic than I do German, so please let me know if I got this wrong!
> 
> Feel free to come say hi to me at [masswisteria.tumblr.com](http://masswisteria.tumblr.com).


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you again to my wonderful beta, [anyilherron](http://anyilherron.tumblr.com)! <3

Fareeha shifted uncomfortably as the truck hit another pothole. The thin scrap of carpet under her provided very little cushioning as they rumbled along the decaying road toward Ciudad Juárez. The relic they were riding in hit another bump, bouncing her in her improvised seat. Fareeha wondered how her grandmother’s generation had survived a lifetime of travel in wheeled cars without getting brain damage.

Somehow, Tracer seemed unaffected by the rough ride, despite sitting right next to her. “How about ‘Ranger?’” She directed the question to McCree, who only rolled his eyes. She had been suggesting callsigns he could use off and on since they left the base at Santa Gertrudis. His lack of interest had thus far had no effect on Tracer’s enthusiasm. “Hmm…’Bad Boy?’”

McCree raised an eyebrow at her. “...Seriously?”

“Okay, maybe not that one. But chin up, we’ll find a good one yet!”

It still felt a little surreal to Fareeha that she was actually on a mission with Lena Oxton - _Tracer_. She was a _legend_. It was the sort of thing she had spent hours imagining, growing up. The grim realities of life as a soldier had long since worn the shine from those daydreams, but a part of her couldn’t help but feel some childlike glee at the idea of working alongside one of her old heroes. Even if said hero was a little...intense...in person.

Fareeha tried to tune out Tracer’s banter with McCree as she went over the mission parameters in her head again. There was a suspected Talon cell operating out of Juárez, making life difficult for the federal authorities trying to finally restore order in the northern Mexican states. The region had been under de facto control of one cartel or another since the Omnic Crisis, suffering through two and a half decades of violence. Their instructions were simple: get into the city, make a positive ID on the Talon cell, take it out, and bring home any intel they can find. With any luck, their mission would shed some light on what Talon’s interest was in the region, as well as the rest of their operations.

Fareeha felt the truck slow, then come to a stop. Tracer stopped in mid-sentence. The rear of the truck had no windows, so the three of them could only wait and listen. McCree carefully drew his sidearm and turned to face the rear doors. Fareeha and Tracer followed suit - better safe than sorry. After a few moments, the sound of boots scraping on the ground came from outside of the vehicle.

“License and travel authorization,” a crisp voice demanded in English - American, Fareeha was pretty sure. They must have hit a checkpoint outside the city.

“Yes, sir,” came the accented reply from their driver, followed by rustling in the front cabin.

The American spoke again. “What’s in the back?” Across from her, McCree tensed.

“Just building supplies, wood, cement, you know,” their driver answered. “We got papers for it…”

“Better let me have those.” There was more rustling. “Yeah, okay, I guess this covers it.”

A few moments later, the engine restarted and they began to move again. McCree holstered his weapon and eased back in his seat, smiling. “Good to see a little bribery still goes a long way around here.”

“Is that what that was?” Fareeha asked.

“Either that, or the Federales got a lot better at forging papers. And I know which one my money’s on.”

Fareeha frowned. “I thought we were supposed to be operating within the law.”

“We are,” McCree said. “Technically. We’re still on Mexican soil, and Mexico invited us in. The US has got no claim here. Hasn’t stopped them from coming down and being a pain in the ass with their 'border security' and ‘buffer zone’ bullshit though.”

“So long as we keep our heads down, that will be the last we’ll have to deal with them,” Tracer added, drawing a loud groan from McCree.

“God dammit Lena why’d you go and say a thing like that. You’re gonna jinx us before we even get started here.”

Lena laughed and shoved his shoulder. "Oh don't be so superstitious!"

Fareeha tuned them back out as the conversation devolved into playful banter. McCree’s explanation left her feeling uneasy. He was right in pointing out that the Americans were an occupying force; there was no virtue in obeying unjust laws imposed by them. But she was unused to having to justify her actions in this way. In the army, and later with Helix, things had been comparatively simple: they were the authority; they had their mandate and operated within that. It was a harsh reminder of the different world she was in now.

It wasn’t much longer before Fareeha felt the truck slow and take a turn, and after a few minutes and several more turns, it came to a stop once again. This time, however, their driver knocked on the wall, giving them the ‘all clear’ sign, and moments later he opened the back doors to let them out. Fareeha squinted at the sudden light, then almost gagged as the sour stench of rotting garbage hit her. Behind her McCree swore, and Tracer said something nonsensical that Fareeha assumed was a British curse. Fareeha did her best to ignore the odor as she climbed out. She stretched her back and took in the scene around her, trying to get her bearings after spending several hours in a dark, windowless box. They were parked in an alley between two decaying concrete buildings. One bore the faded remains of a decades old advertisement for some soft drink that likely no longer existed. A heavily rusted fire escape dangled alarmingly from the side of the other, several bolts having pulled free from the wall. Further into the alley there was a dumpster, overflowing with trash. More bags had been piled around it.

“Christ, Miguel,” Lena said as she climbed down after Fareeha. “you couldn’t have found a nicer place to drop us off?”

“Welcome to Juárez,” their driver said with a shrug.

“It wasn’t always this bad,” McCree grumbled.

“Yeah, things have gotten worse in the last year. Cartels have been fighting more, and then there’s…well, you know.” He waited for them to retrieve their gear, then slammed the truck doors shut. “You all be careful out here, okay? Good luck.” With that, he climbed back into the cab and drove off, leaving the three agents alone in the alley.

“Alright, let’s get the hell out of the dump,” McCree said, heading toward the street. Fareeha and Tracer followed after.

The alley opened onto a quiet, narrow street, with no one on it at the moment other than themselves. More concrete buildings lined either side, rising two or three stories up. Most seemed to contain shops and apartments; Fareeha couldn’t tell for sure, being unable to read the Spanish signs. None appeared to be in much better shape than the two they had stopped between.

McCree took the lead and guided them through the city; his familiarity with the region made him the logical choice to take point. Fareeha continued to study their surroundings as they went, attaching images to the names she had memorized from maps for the mission. Poverty and decay seemed to be endemic to the city, and on almost every street she spotted evidence of the violence that kept it that way. Façades that had once been decorated with vibrant colors and intricate stonework were now faded and disfigured, chipped and pockmarked by stray gunfire. Elsewhere buildings had been burnt and left to rot, blackened beams rising above the char like grave markers. In the street Fareeha noted shattered curbs and deep, round potholes that she immediately recognized as the aftermath of IEDs. They saw few vehicles on the road, and several of those they did see were patrols - heavily armored US Army transports. The specs came to Fareeha’s mind immediately: an automatic grenade launcher and a pair of .50 caliber heavy machine guns up top, six to eight infantry inside armed with rifles and RPGs, and a commander hooked into a half dozen drones providing air support- in short, something they did not want to engage unless necessary. Thankfully, their mission did not call for that.

Fareeha’s heart raged at what had been done to this city and its people. Hundreds of thousands of innocent bystanders had been put through unimaginable fear and chaos and grief, all because of the greed of a handful of warlords. Meanwhile the rest of the world did nothing - or in the case of the Americans, worse than nothing: invading and occupying, sacrificing the safety and freedom of others to protect their own, as though there were any real difference between the citizens of Juárez and the citizens of El Paso. This was why she had wanted to join Overwatch in the first place: to help right wrongs and dispense justice when no one else could be bothered to care. Doctor Ziegler’s words to her burned in her mind. Fareeha knew she was right, and yet thinking about their mission and taking in the scenes around her, she couldn’t help but wonder if the doctor was missing the point.

Eventually they turned onto a street that Fareeha recognized from the mission briefing. Halfway down the block, she spotted their target on the other side of the street. From a quick glance she could see that the building matched the photos that the Mexican government had provided in their intelligence report. It was a two story stucco building between two single story shops, with a balcony overlooking the street and a large garage occupying most of the ground floor. Two men stood on the balcony smoking, looking nonchalant in the way that only armed guards can. McCree gave no sign of noticing it and walked right past, then entered a pale pink-painted building just up the street. ‘Hotel de la Rosa’ read the sign above the door.

Inside they found a rundown yet functional hotel lobby. A middle-aged woman stood behind a counter across from the door, and a handful of low tables and chairs filled the middle of the room. A staircase in the back of the room led upstairs, but Fareeha saw no obvious exits save the door they came in. McCree approached the counter to see about getting a room, leaving Tracer and Fareeha to mind their gear. They had packed light by necessity, carrying only backpacks and a beat up duffle bag; too much baggage might have drawn unwanted suspicion. After a brief exchange with the woman, McCree paid for their room - the one part of the conversation Fareeha had understood: “ _Pesos?_ ” she had asked, and “No, dólares,” came his reply - then gestured for Tracer and Fareeha to follow him up the stairs. They went up a single flight to the second floor, then down to the end of the hallway. Their room was in the corner of the building, giving them a perfect view back down the street to the suspected Talon base.

McCree entered first, slowly and cautiously; no one should have had any reason to expect them to come here, but there was no need for unnecessary chances. The room was spartanly furnished. A small wood table and two chairs occupied one corner, and a single queen-sized bed filled most of the remaining space. As soon as they were all inside, McCree shut and locked the door, then wedged one of the chairs under the handle.

“Alright, let’s get to work,” he said. “Tracer, you’re running ops. You get the computer up while I deal with the sensors. Pharah, check over arms and ordinance.” Tracer began unpacking the surveillance equipment onto the table before McCree had finished his orders, pulling first a tablet and then several small cameras and sensors from one of the backpacks. Meanwhile Fareeha opened up the duffle bag and pulled out several bundles, padded and foil-wrapped to obscure their contents, and began unwrapping them one-by-one. When she was done, the components for two submachine guns lay before her on the bed, along with magazines, a few pulse bombs for Tracer, and a handful of shaped charges. Not a lot, but they were limited by what they could reasonably smuggle into the city. Fareeha set about assembling the guns, checking over each piece for any maintenance needs as she went, moving through the well practiced process almost automatically.

Finished with her task, Fareeha joined Tracer and McCree at the table, watching over Tracer’s shoulder as she connected cables to the tablet propped up in front of her. McCree stood at the window, positioning cameras and sensors between the curtains and the window pane. At his direction Tracer tapped on the tablet to display the various views now available to them, bringing up first visual then thermal and ultraviolet images of their target. Tracer tapped again, and after a few moments a 3D scan of the building appeared onscreen. Another tap overlaid the thermal image on the scan, showing them the positions of every living person along with any other heat sources in the building.

“There we go!” Tracer said. “Looks like we got…eight inside, plus the two on the balcony? Armed, but nothing more exciting than a shotgun or rifle. A few computers, but nothing else interesting. This should be a piece of cake!”

“Aren’t we getting ahead of ourselves here?” Fareeha asked.

Tracer turned to look up over her shoulder at her, a questioning look on her face. “Huh? Oh, right, right!” She flipped the view back to visual mode, laughing sheepishly. “Gotta confirm this is Talon first. Sure looks like them though…”

“Yeah,” McCree said. “But let’s make sure this is the right party before we crash it. Soon as we get a good look at any of these guys, facial recognition should tell us if they're someone we know.”

After a minute more Fareeha took a seat on the foot of the bed. “So…I guess now we wait?”

“Now we wait,” McCree agreed, sitting on the floor, his back against the wall.

Lena drummed her fingers against the table. “So…anyone bring a deck of cards?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Look! People are actually _doing_ things instead of just _talking_! Amazing! :P (more of that to come in the next chapter, I promise)
> 
> #### Translations:
> 
> _Federales_
>      (Spanish) Feds, short for "federal agents," e.g. Mexican Federal Police
> _Hotel de la Rosa_
>      (Spanish) Rose Hotel
> _No, dólares_
>      (Spanish) No, dollars
> 
> Oh my god why do I keep writing in languages I don't know.
> 
> Feel free to come say hi to me at [masswisteria.tumblr.com](http://masswisteria.tumblr.com)!


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you again to my wonderful beta, [anyilherron](http://anyilherron.tumblr.com)! <3

Tracer pulled the chair out from under the doorknob and opened the door. In walked McCree, holding a grease-stained paper bag - their dinner. Fareeha perked up at the thought; she did not feel particularly hungry, but the idea of eating was appealing if only for the sheer novelty after the monotony of the last five hours.

“Did I miss anything?” McCree asked.

“Nothing worth mentioning,” Fareeha sighed.

McCree nodded as he began passing out whatever it was that he brought back with him. He looked carefully at one before handing it to Fareeha. “Here, this one’s vegetarian.”

“Oh, thank you,” she said, surprised and genuinely grateful. “I hadn’t thought to say something.”

McCree smiled and shrugged. “Yeah, well, you’re not the first Amari I’ve been stuck on a stakeout with.”

She took a bite of the vegetable and cheese-filled tortilla and turned her attention back to the tablet. A sedan and a pair of SUVs had pulled up outside the building. After a moment, the front door opened and a man and a woman stepped out. They stopped just outside the door, apparently still talking with someone inside, denying Fareeha a clear look at their faces.

“Who’re the suits?” McCree asked around a mouthful of tortilla. He leaned over Fareeha’s shoulder to get a closer look. She zoomed in on the pair, and realized he was right. There was just enough light from the open doorway for her to see that both the man and the woman were dressed in business wear - quite the departure from the rest of the people they had seen around the building, where denim and plaid seemed to be the extent of the dress code. As she watched, the woman shifted, giving Fareeha a brief look at the top of the portfolio she was holding.

“Wait a moment,” she said, rewinding and freezing the video. Another look confirmed what she thought she saw: a pale blue stepped pyramid. She pointed at it on screen. “Look. LumériCo.”

“Huh. What’re a couple of big shots from LumériCo doing visiting terrorists in Juárez?”

The same question was running through Fareeha’s mind. She brought the normal feed back up, and continued watching, hoping for a clue to the answer.

“Maybe it’s a payoff?” Tracer offered from over Fareeha’s other shoulder. “Cheaper to buy protection than rebuild a blown up plant.”

“Hmm.” McCree sounded unconvinced.

Finally the pair finished their conversation and turned toward the car, giving the cameras a perfect view of their faces. After a few seconds, a pair of photos and bios popped up on the screen.

“Silvia Delgado Perez, 47, VP of Market Development, LumériCo,” Fareeha read.

“And Raúl Muñoz Aguilar, 29, Senior Manager,” McCree added. “Well that doesn’t tell us much, just confirms they’re LumériCo…but wait a sec, who’s this guy?” Someone had stepped outside to watch the pair leave, and after a moment a third bio appeared. “Haha, here we go. I thought he looked familiar.” Fareeha looked at him over her shoulder, waiting for an explanation. “Sergio Navarro. He used to run with the Deadlock Gang, back in the day. Dropped off the grid a little after I joined Overwatch, then turned up a few years later in Marseilles.”

Fareeha’s eyes widened. “The madrasa bombing? That was him?”

“Yep. Him, and the rest of his Talon cell.”

“So this _is_ Talon. Now do we go in?” Tracer asked.

McCree nodded. “We go in.”

 

Fareeha tightened the straps on her backpack, then waved toward the hotel to indicate that she was reading Tracer loud and clear. She and McCree stood on the roof of the Talon hideout, a good five meters back from the edge overlooking the street, waiting for Tracer’s signal. Fareeha rolled her shoulders, trying to release some of her pent-up tension. It had been a long time since she had gone into combat so…’naked’ was the only word that came to mind, as if night camouflage and tactical gear were nothing at all. But then, compared to the Raptora armor, they may as well be.

Lena’s voice came through Fareeha’s earpiece. “Alright loves, no change inside the house, let’s get this show on the road, yeah?”

She glanced toward McCree, then nodded as he signaled to advance. They both crept forward silently, separating as they approached the edge. Fareeha stopped just close enough to allow her to take a peek past it. She readied her weapon in her hands, then stepped over the edge. With barely a sound she landed on the balcony, just behind one of the sentries. In one smooth, practiced gesture she looped her garrote around over his head and yanked the wire tight around his throat, cutting off the guard’s air before he had a chance to turn around. One swift kick buckled his knees and dropped him to a more manageable height. A dark ring bloomed around his neck and began streaming downward as the thin cord cut into soft flesh, and he immediately started flailing in panic, first at the cord around his throat then at her, hands grasping aimlessly over his shoulders, trying to find purchase on something, anything. His hands found her wrists, but he could only tug at them impotently as Fareeha put her strength to use. She raised one knee into his back and pushed, pulling the cord even tighter with the added leverage. His choking gasps grew weaker; a sudden spray of blood shot from his neck and splattered wetly against the wall, followed by several weaker spurts from his now severed carotid artery. Moments later Fareeha felt the guard’s body go slack, and she quietly lowered him to the ground. She leaned over the corpse, panting, letting the burning ache drain out of her arms, seeing McCree doing the same on the other side of the balcony, the body of the other sentry at his feet. This was a tiring way to kill someone, and grisly - the blood splattered on the wall and pooling at her feet would attest to that - but it was also silent and effective, which was what they needed.

“Okay, so far, so good,” Tracer spoke through Fareeha’s earpiece. “The top floor’s still empty. Go through this room to the hall and turn right, the stairs will be all the way at the end. There’s four downstairs, looks like two at a table and two on a sofa.”

McCree moved to the balcony door, pistol in hand, and after a nod from Fareeha opened it. The room was dark, but enough light shown through from the street for Fareeha to make out the shapes of cots and bedrolls and little else. They moved quickly but cautiously; Fareeha was mindful of the potential for the bare wooden floor to give them away to the remaining terrorists below. The route to the stairs was just as empty as Tracer had said, and they cleared it quickly. The staircase opened to their right onto the last room of the building; light and conversation spilled into the stairs from there. Fareeha took point, creeping down until she was within arm’s reach of the corner. After a few good looks with a tactical mirror, she gestured to McCree: _I’ll take the two near, you take the two far._

McCree rolled his eyes and shook his head at her, and before Fareeha could respond he slipped past her and around the corner. Four gunshots rang out, almost immediately, and then he was gesturing the ‘all clear’ at her. Fareeha swept around the corner, and...okay, she was impressed. Four bullets, four head shots, four kills. She eyed McCree appraisingly. “Not bad.”

McCree smirked. “Yeah, I’m good. Tracer, call for our ride, we’ll be done here soon.”

“Roger that, Wild Bill.” Fareeha could practically hear Tracer’s grin over the comm line.

McCree just shook his head as he walked over to the table and nudged aside one of the bodies so he could rifle through the few papers there. “You bring the fireworks?” he asked Fareeha.

“On it,” Fareeha answered. In her pack were several explosives, each with a shaped charge to focus their energy up rather than out. She began setting them up now; if properly spread out around the ground floor, they should thoroughly destroy the building with minimal damage to the surrounding area.

“Nothing but trash,” McCree snorted, tossing a handful of papers to the ground.

“There’s a couple small heat signatures upstairs, probably computers,” Lena suggested over the comm channel. “Unless Talon keeps cats?”

“Now there’s an idea,” McCree said, snickering as he headed back upstairs. “We could tell the commander that they’ll keep mice out of the base.”

Lena laughed. “Oh could you imagine his face?”

“Heh, yeah I kinda want to do this now just to-” The loud crack of a rifle shot cut off the rest of his sentence.

“Sniper!” Tracer yelled over the line. “McCree, are you alright?”

“Sniper my ass, they’re in the building! We fucking missed one!” McCree answered.

“I don’t see any sign of them! Are you sure?”

A burst of gunfire came from upstairs. “Yeah, I’m pretty damn sure!”

“I’m on my way.” Fareeha ran, holstering her pistol and unstrapping her submachine gun at the sound of automatic weapons fire from upstairs. She peeked around the corner and ducked back quickly as whoever it was sent a hail of gunfire her way. Fareeha had to shield her face from the chips of plaster and paint that went flying as the bullets hit the wall. She heard the loud crack of McCree’s gun as he fired off a couple rounds. _Now, while she’s dodging McCree’s fire._ Fareeha pivoted and fired off a three round burst at where the gunman _should_ have been, but there was no one there. She hissed at the crack of a rifle and sudden stinging burn of a bullet grazing her arm. _Where the hell are they?_

“They cleared the doorway, I’m advancing,” McCree said on the line.

“Hold position, the hallway is not clear!” Fareeha got out her tactical mirror again, and scanned the hallway trying to find where the shooter was. A flicker of motion caught her eye just before the mirror was shattered by a bullet. _He’s on the god damned_ ceiling _?!_ She fired on their position quickly, before they could reposition, but only hit the ceiling as he - no, _she_ \- dropped and rolled through a doorway. “She’s gone into the bedroom,” Fareeha announced on the comm, as she advanced down the hallway. McCree soon joined her at the bedroom doorway.

With a nod, Fareeha swung into the room. She caught a brief glimpse of their target - she was tall, with impractically long hair, and was carrying some serious hardware - before she disappeared behind a cloud of smoke. It stung Fareeha’s eyes, and she began coughing almost immediately.

“Gas!” she heard McCree yell, and she stumbled down the hallway as he pulled her by the arm toward the stairs.

“Oh you gotta be _shitting_ me!” Lena cried.

“What?”

“ _Fucking hell!_ ”

“Tracer, status!” McCree yelled.

“It’s Amélie!”

“Widowmaker? Son of a bitch,” he muttered.

“She grappled over to the building north of the hotel. I’m in pursuit,” Tracer said.

“Negative!” McCree ordered.

“But-”

“We’ve still got a mission to complete, and we’ve already attracted enough attention,” McCree explained. “Three or four gunshots ain’t worth the army’s time, in this town, but our Shootout at the Juárez Corral will sure as hell get their attention. Tear down surveillance and meet us at the extraction point. What’s the status on our transport?”

“Victor is inbound, ETA: twenty-two minutes,” Tracer answered.

McCree turned to Fareeha. “You alright?”

She gave a few more weak coughs and nodded.

“I only had a chance to grab one laptop from upstairs, but it’ll have to do, with those rooms filling up with God knows what. Where are you at with the bombs?”

“Primed and ready, just say when,” she answered.

He cracked a smile. “Probably want to wait until we get clear first. Let’s move.” He led the way to a back door that opened onto a dark alley behind the building. They followed that for a couple blocks, hugging the buildings and keeping to shadows as much as possible.

“Okay, this is good enough. Tracer, you clear?”

“Of the bombs, yeah,” she responded over the line, somewhat breathlessly. “But uh you know those Yanks you were talking about? I might’ve maybe run into them.”

“Shit,” McCree said to himself. “Can you get clear of them? We can’t bring any heat down on the LZ, or the vic’s just gonna fly right by.”

“I think so.”

“Do it. Try not to do anything that’ll tick off the doc. Now about those bombs…” He nodded to Fareeha, who had been waiting with the detonator in her hands. She punched in the code and pressed the trigger, and the night erupted in light and sound. “Maybe that’ll take some attention off of Tracer.”

McCree stayed on point as they slowly made their way to the landing zone, sticking to shadowy back alleys and dimly lit side streets whenever possible. There didn’t seem to be any patrols nearby, but drones could be just about anywhere. Fareeha kept watch on their six for anyone in pursuit, but their trail stayed clean and after about ten minutes they were passing through rows of rusted out railroad cars and into the abandoned rail yard that contained their extraction point.

They crossed the open yard to a smaller, fenced in area, walking through knee-high weeds growing out of the dirt or through cracks in the patches of pavement that remained. McCree squeezed through an opening where the chainlink fencing had come loose from a rusted fence post. Fareeha followed him in, and hissed as the metal scraped against her wound.

“You’re injured,” McCree said.

“It’s nothing, just a scratch.”

McCree spat. “Yeah, I’ve heard that one before. Let’s see it.” Fareeha stripped off her vest and outer camo, leaving herself in a dark tank top. Her right bicep was streaked with blood, most of it dry. McCree went to work cleaning and lightly dressing the injury. “You did good out there today,” he said. “Army trained you well, huh? I guess maybe Helix too.”

“Not good enough.” Fareeha nodded towards her arm.

“Nah, don’t worry about that. It’s just a scratch,” he said with a wink, and Fareeha laughed. “Now...where the hell is Tracer?” he asked.

Lena pressed back against the alley wall, waiting for the patrol to move past. She breathed a sigh of relief as they turned at the end of the block. She stepped out into the street, then dove back inside the alley as another patrol turned toward her. _That’s it, this is bloody stupid._ She couldn’t take two steps on the road without risking getting spotted.

So the obvious choice was to get off the road. Lena backtracked up the alley to the first fire escape she found, and climbed her way to the roof of the two-story building as quietly as she could on rickety steel stairs. Once at the top she made her way toward the edge of the roof and looked out over the street. It was a bit far, but she could manage it. She waited until the patrol was a little past her, backed away from the ledge, and took a running leap over it. At the peak of her jump she blinked, instantly shooting across the street and appearing with a grunt on the rooftop of the opposite building. _Piece of cake._ She grinned to herself as she walked casually across the roof. The scrape of boots on gravel and the sudden feel of a gun barrel against her head wiped the smile from her face.

“Mouche ennuyante.”

Lena froze.

“Why are you here?” Amélie demanded.

Lena chuckled nervously. “That’s funny...I was gonna ask you the same thing, Amélie!”

She winces as Amélie’s gun dug into her temple. “Do not call me that.”

Lena strained to get a look at her out of the corner of her eye. Amélie looked back at her with a mixture of frustration and disdain. _That had to be better than boredom, right?_ “Why not? I-it’s your name, ain’t it?”

“Not anymore. Why are you here?” She asked again. “Réponds-moi. Maintenant.”

“Haha, look, I’d love to, but I kinda got somewhere to be...you know how it is, right? So anyway...” Amélie’s mouth twitched into a deeper frown. “Bye!” Lena said as she binked away.

Gunfire erupted behind her, and Lena dove behind an exhaust duct as Amélie raked the rooftop with bullets. As soon as Amélie stopped to reload Lena took off running again, dropping down a story as she moved from one building to the next. She blinked ahead, just dodging a burst of gunfire. Halfway across the roof she was suddenly bathed in light.

“Freeze! Put down your weapons!” The orders came from above, where a pair of drones circled overhead, shining spotlights down on both of them. _So much for rooftops._

Lena’s hands dropped toward her waist. She looked back toward Amélie, who met her gaze. In a flash, they both moved and fired, Lena with her blasters and Amélie with her rifle, and both drones fell to the ground in pieces. Lena spared one glance over her shoulder to watch Amélie grappling across to another building - in retreat, not pursuit - then blinked back down to the ground.

Lena paused at the corner of the alley, thinking over how she was going to play this. Six soldiers were closing in, maybe fifty meters up the street from her. But they weren’t the problem; she could outrun _them_. It was the bloody huge APC behind them - with its .50 caliber guns - that was the problem. But there might be a way. She configured her chrono accelerator beneath her jacket, drew her blasters, and waited for them to close on her. _Forty meters… Thirty meters… Twenty…Now._

She flew around the corner, firing her blasters just enough to send the soldiers diving for cover. As they were about to return fire she holstered her guns and blinked past them, ending up right alongside the APC. A quick flick of each wrist, and its undercarriage suddenly had a pair of pulse bombs attached to it. With a blue flash she blinked up the street, further back behind the soldiers, then dove into an alley just as the bombs went off. She peeked around the corner, and grinned at the sight. The bombs hadn’t scratched the APC’s armor; it was still intact, except for the shattered remains of its magnetic repulsors littering the ground around it. That thing wasn’t going anywhere for a while. She stuck around just long enough for a soldier to spot her, then ducked into the alley and activated her accelerator’s Recall function, warping her right back to the alley she had been in a few seconds ago, and leaving the Yanks to chase a ghost in the other direction.

Lena was panting by the time she made it to the freight yard, having run nearly the rest of the way there. She jogged across to where she saw Jesse and Fareeha, eyes going wide when she noticed the bandage around the latter’s arm.

“Just a scratch,” Fareeha told her, drawing a chuckle from Jesse for some reason.

“Oh, good.” Above them, they heard the sound of the VTOL transport coming in to land. She turned to Jesse. “Say, you don’t think the commander’ll be peeved if I blew up an APC, do you?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ## Translation Notes
> 
> _Madrasa (مدرسة)_
>      (Arabic) School; Educational institution
> _Mouche ennuyante._
>      (French) Annoying fly.
> _Réponds-moi. Maintenant._
>      (French) Answer me. Now.


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you again to my wonderful beta, [anyilherron](http://anyilherron.tumblr.com)! <3
> 
> Any appearance of incorrect medical terminology is completely due to language changes that occurred between now and when Overwatch takes place, and certainly not at all due to me making this stuff up as a go along. ;)

Three days. Three long, exhausting days. It took three days of scrubbing, mopping, and dusting, but finally Angela had the infirmary ready to receive patients. Or as ready as it could be, considering that all of their perishable supplies had long since expired - even the nitrile gloves needed to be replaced. Hopefully she would not need to synthesize any antibiotics in the next week or so.

She dropped down onto one of the exam room office chairs with a heavy sigh. There were still plenty of things left for her to do. She needed to get the supply list to Jack for ordering. She needed to warm up the nano-biotic reactors, so they would be ready when supplies _did_ arrive. And she needed to deal with her office. Angela could see it from where she sat, through the large window that let her keep an eye on the infirmary while working with some amount of privacy. It remained as an island of dust and clutter in an otherwise spotless space. “ Jetzt oder nie,” she muttered, pushing herself up out of the chair and walking toward her office. She paused at the doorway, taking in the scene before her. Her desk was a disaster, as usual. Stacks of journals and papers littered the surface, threatening to bury her old computer. One corner held the desiccated corpse of a philodendron plant - which Angela felt vaguely bad about - and a handful of coffee mugs she was afraid to look inside of. It was like a time capsule, virtually untouched since the moment she received the call that sent her rushing to Geneva six years ago, already too late. It wasn’t a time she particularly wanted to be reminded of. _The sooner I start, the sooner I can get back to forgetting._

She sat down at her desk and went to work sorting through the papers. Some were medical test results or images from scans; these she set aside for processing. Even if they were likely no longer relevant, the clinician in her demanded that she make sure they were added to the subjects’ records before she disposed of them. The rest were journal articles or research papers, their pages replete with comments and annotations written in Angela’s own neat script. The papers’ titles were vaguely familiar to her, though she could not recall their contents, or what she had been studying at the time that had led her to them in the first place. Out of curiosity - _and not at_ all _as an attempt at distraction_ \- she switched on her computer to see what she had been working on. The machine sprang to life, spinning and cycling as it worked to resume its six-year old state, and she felt a sudden pang of sympathy for the thing. Finally it finished, and Angela was left looking over several spreadsheets and documents. Athena’s automated voice interrupted her before she could dig into their contents.

“Doctor Ziegler, the agents McCree, Oxton, and Amari have returned from their mission,” the computer announced.

“Have they reported any injuries?”

“No; however, a visual scan indicates that Agent Amari has sustained a minor laceration to her right brachium.”

Angela sighed. “Athena, you shouldn’t use that title. We aren’t agents anymore.”

“Commander Morrison has assigned the rank of ‘Agent’ to all non-officer members of the organization.”

“I see….” Angela swore Athena sounded smug correcting her. “Please inform _Agent_ Amari that she is to report to the infirmary, immediately.” Angela had not tolerated agents downplaying or hiding their injuries in the Overwatch days, and she sure as hell was not going to start tolerating it now. She busied herself by looking through some of the documents on her computer. She found several of her old works-in-progress: ‘Longitudinal study of nanobiotic use in the treatment of nonlethal injury;’ ‘Nanobiotic neural pathway reconfiguration in PTSD patients;’ ‘Applications of hard-light in adaptive flight control surfaces.’ It dawned on her that she hadn’t published anything - or conducted any research, for that matter - in almost seven years; perhaps it was time to change that. Angela made a mental note to look over these and see what work remained to get them ready for publishing, and continued looking through her old files. Before long she heard the familiar chime indicating someone’s arrival in the infirmary, and she looked up to see Fareeha stepping inside, the large double doors sliding shut behind her. Angela grabbed her lab coat from where it hung behind her office door and put it on as she went out to greet her patient.

“Agent Amari, I understand you received an injury on your mission.” Angela’s tone was deceptively friendly. “And yet there was no mention of this in the preliminary mission report.”

“Yes.” Fareeha waved her right arm, drawing attention to the gauze wrapped around her biceps. “But it was treated on site.”

Angela raised an eyebrow. “Oh? I was unaware that Jesse had earned a medical degree in the last few years. Or perhaps it was Lena who did?”

Fareeha’s eyes shifted away from hers. “No, not that I’m aware of. But it’s fine, really.”

 _If I had a franc for every time I’ve heard that one..._ “I’ll be the judge of that, thank you. Right this way to exam room one please.” She guided Fareeha there, grabbing a medical gown from a supply cabinet along the way. The ‘exam room’ was one of several small curtained off sections of the infirmary, just large enough for an exam table, a chair, and basic diagnostic equipment. Angela handed Fareeha the gown and gestured to the table. Fareeha’s eyes went wide at the sight of the gown, but Angela preempted any protest from her. “As long as I have you here, I may as well get your intake physical out of the way. Now, take off your clothes and put on the gown, and take a seat on the exam table when you are ready.” She left the small room and closed the curtain behind her, giving Fareeha some privacy as she changed.

Moments later Fareeha announced that she was ready, and Angela re-entered the room, medical tablet in hand and towing a diagnostic scanner behind her. “Now then, subject is Fareeha Amari, female, thirty…two years old?” The last came out as a question, and Fareeha nodded her head. The tablet echoed the words back, confirming the data entry. “Let’s start with basic vitals, then eye, ear, nose, and throat assessment.” At her words the scanner came to life, its articulated, sensor-laden arm moving to scan over Fareeha’s forehead. Angela set the tablet down, opened up the right sleeve of Fareeha’s gown, and began unwrapping her wound. “Now, let’s see what we have,” she said softly, more to herself than anyone else. “Subject sustained a GSW to the right brachium, resulting in a minor laceration approximately 2 millimeters deep and 3.5 centimeters long running orthogonally across the middle of the triceps. Some inflammation and swelling around the wound” - Angela paused and gave Fareeha a meaningful look, noting her flinch when she pressed lightly around the wound - “and is tender, suggesting a mild infection.” She emphasized the last word, and Fareeha sighed.

Angela pulled the chair around to sit facing her, holding her gaze. “Fareeha, I do not mean to berate you, or scold you, but it is imperative that all agents report and receive treatment for injuries such as this one. An infection can kill you, and it does not care how well you can shoot,” she eyed Fareeha, considering the well-built pectoralis major and deltoid just visible through the open sleeve, and the firm triceps brachii she had felt, before continuing with a slight smile, “or how much you can bench press.” The comment earned her a bit of a smile from her patient, softening the mood between them.

“I understand, Doctor,” she said. “And I will not let it happen again. This is just…” She looked away again as her voice trailed off.

“Just what?”

“I would have come to see you later. The injury is an uncomfortable reminder of a mistake, and I wished to not think about it for some time,” Fareeha said, staring off at a point somewhere behind Angela.

“What do you mean?”

“It is stupid, I know,” she said, color rising in her cheeks.

 _Ah. Diagnosis: perfectionism._ Angela should have expected as much, given Fareeha’s lineage. She leaned forward in her chair and laid her hand lightly on Fareeha’s knee, drawing her eyes back to Angela’s. “Everyone who goes out on missions will come back with injuries from time to time. Even I’ve been shot…” - Angela thought for a moment - “three...four times? It is nothing to be ashamed of. Not in our line of work.”

She hoped the words would ease her, but Fareeha shook her head. “No, it is not that.” She let out a deep sigh before continuing. “The shooter...I missed them. On our sweep through the building. She was able to sneak up behind Agent McCree and me, and nearly had us both. This ‘Widowmaker,’” Angela’s eyes widened in surprise, and Fareeha paused, seeing her reaction. “You know of her?”

Angela leaned back and buried her face in her hands. “You could say that.”

“Agent Oxton called her ‘Amélie...”

“Yes, she would.” Angela looked up again. “If Widowmaker gave you this injury, then you should wear it as a badge of honor, as one of the few to go against her and live to tell the tale.” It was Fareeha’s turn to show surprise. “I assume that you are not familiar with her history?”

“No, Agents McCree and Oxton both seemed reluctant to discuss it, and I did not press them.”

Angela nodded, imagining the uncomfortable atmosphere that must have permeated the transport on the long flight back to base. “I am unsurprised. But there are things you should know about her.” It was not a tale Angela enjoyed telling, and it came out in clipped, terse statements. Fareeha listened with dawning horror as Angela described the disappearance and sudden reappearance of her one-time friend Amélie Lecroix, the murder of Amélie’s husband Gerard, and Amélie’s transformation into the Talon agent known as Widowmaker. Angela omitted some of the more sensitive details; there was no need to go into Lena’s history with her, nor Angela’s direct role in the story.

Fareeha breathed out a heavy sigh. “That is...quite the tragedy. I am surprised that it was never made public though, during the hearings. It seems like exactly the sort of scandal the commitee would have gone after.”

Angela nodded. “Yes, I’ve often wondered about that, if it was because...well, never mind. Suffice to say that Widowmaker is extremely skilled and exceedingly dangerous. There is no shame in allowing her to get the drop on you.”

“I understand.”

“Good,” Angela said, rising to her feet. “Now, I should finish tending to your injury.”

“Of course. Thank you for explaining, it is good to know who and what I am dealing with.”

Angela paused momentarily in the process of irrigating the wound. “‘Dealing with?’ You mean to go after her?”

“I do. Insofar as I can within the course of our missions. I owe her, and it seems there is much she must be brought to justice for,” Fareeha’s face bore a grim look of determination, her jaw set in a way Angela found startlingly familiar.

Angela frowned. “She is not your responsibility, you know. You’re right that she needs to be brought to justice. And we will do that - together as a team. That is part of why I agreed to join up, actually.” Angela suppressed a wince; she had not meant to say that. Fareeha looked over her shoulder questioningly, and Angela considered whether it would be more uncomfortable to cover up her mistake or to come clean with Fareeha; she opted to come clean. “I...I was the one who examined Amélie after the kidnapping. Jack...Commander Morrison...he insisted that I be the one to do it, that he wanted ‘the absolute best to look at her.’” Angela paused in her work, the tube of antibiotic gel shaking in her hands. “So I did. I examined her. And I cleared her to be sent home. And because of that Gérard, Tekhartha Mondatta, and countless others are dead.”

She felt Fareeha’s hand on her’s. “I am sure you did what you could.”

“I…” Angela sniffed and cleared her throat, her voice suddenly tight. “Danke, I appreciate the sentiment.”

Neither of them spoke again as Angela finished treating and dressing the wound. It was Fareeha who broke the silence, speaking carefully, as though she was uncertain of the effect of her words. “I think you got it wrong, before. I always wanted to join Overwatch because I wanted to help and protect people, and build the world that should be. That was the reason for Overwatch’s existence. Here...we may not have the name, or respect, or fame, but we seem to have the same cause, and isn’t that what really matters?”

Angela set down the bandages she had been packing away. “Perhaps...I hope that you are right.” An idea suddenly occurred to her. “Oh! On that note, wait here, I have something you might like!”

“Oh...okay?” Fareeha said as Angela rushed out of the exam room.

She headed straight to one of the supply closets, and opened the cardboard box she had found just the day before. She had no idea what it was doing there; it had no business being in the infirmary, but things were probably fairly hectic in the watchpoints in the days leading up to the end. She dug through its contents until she found what she was looking for, then hurried back to the exam room.

“Here, I thought you might like this,” Angela said, handing it to Fareeha. Her face lit up as she took it in: a simple white, ribbed tank top, emblazoned with the Overwatch logo.

“You have no idea how much I’ve always wanted something like this!” Fareeha exclaimed. “Mom never brought me home anything Overwatch-related, she always said she ‘didn’t want to give me any ideas.’” She rolled her eyes as she quoted Ana, then added, uncertainly, “May I put it on now?”

Angela smiled, surprised at how pleased Fareeha seemed to be by her simple gesture. “Oh, go ahead. We can finish your physical later; I’ll want that” - she gestured to Fareeha’s arm - “to clear up before we do any bloodwork, anyway.”

Fareeha immediately began stripping off the gown, and Angela quickly turned around to give her some privacy, even if Fareeha didn’t seem to be thinking about that at the moment. “There! It fits perfectly.”

Angela turned back around to see, and Fareeha was absolutely right. “Indeed, it suits you.”

“I always knew it would.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> #### Translation Notes
> 
> _Jetzt oder nie_
>      (German) Now or never.
> _Danke_
>      (German) Thank you.


	7. Chapter 7

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you to [asterCrash](http://archiveofourown.org/users/asterCrash) for betaing this chapter. <3

“Now, Jesse, you want to tell us what this meeting is all about?” Jack asked, and Angela looked up across the low table that sat between them, curious to hear his answer. In all their years in Overwatch together, she could not once recall having received a meeting invitation from Jesse McCree.

Jesse answered Jack’s question with a wink before twisting around to retrieve a couple boxes from behind the sofa he was sitting on. _No, not boxes,_ cases _. Of beer._ He deposited them on the table with a heavy thunk and the clinking of glass against glass, and settled back in his chair, with his arms folded behind his head and grinning, looking altogether too pleased with himself.

Jack’s gaze shifted from Jesse to the cases and back again. “Beer. You called a meeting to drink beer.”

Jesse shrugged. “Didn’t wanna drink alone.”

Reinhardt leaned forward from his place next to Angela and pulled a bottle out of the nearest case. “Weren't you complaining about having nothing to drink just the other day? Don’t tell me you stopped at the store on the way back from Mexico.”

“Nah, I went rooting around in my old room, found these in the bottom of the wardrobe.”

Torbjörn barked a laugh. “So you called a meeting to drink warm, six year old beer.”

“Warm, six year old, _American_ beer,” Reinhardt added, eyeing the label of the bottle in his hand suspiciously. He popped the bottle cap off with a shrug. “Eh, beggars can’t be choosers.”

“Hey there’s nothing wrong with PBR,” Jack defended, grabbing a bottle for himself as if to back up his claim.

“Now there’s the spirit,” Jesse said. He began passing out bottles to the rest of those gathered around the table; Lena and Torbjörn accepted unenthusiastically, while Winston declined, mumbling something about having too much work to do to be able to afford killing brain cells. Jesse held a bottle toward Angela, and Lena’s eyes flicked in her direction, but Angela declined with a shake of her head.

“You sure, doc?”

She offered him a smile. “Quite sure, thanks. _Someone_ has to stay sober to treat you all when you make yourselves sick drinking this.” It was as good an excuse as any.

“Suit yourself. Fareeha?” Eyes turned to where she stood apart from the rest of them, leaning stiffly against the wall.

She shifted uncomfortably under their collective gaze. “Ah, I’m fine, thank you.”

“Aw, come on!”

“Well at least come take a seat with the rest of us.” Angela shifted over to make room between herself and Reinhardt. She did her best to ignore the puffs of dust that arose from the sofa cushion as she patted the now empty space.

“Yeah, take a seat next to the doc and stop lurking in the back like you’re too good for us,” Jesse said, his words softened by his grin. “Only Jack’s allowed to do that.”

“Not too good for the team, just too good for you, Jesse,” Jack corrected.

Angela thought she saw the beginnings of a smile on Fareeha’s lips. “Alright, alright,” she said, pushing off the wall and moving to squeeze herself into the space Angela had made. It left the three of them pressed hip to hip, but if anyone was uncomfortable they showed no signs of it.

Jesse set the bottle down for Fareeha to take or leave as she wished, seeming content that she was at least no longer being a literal wallflower. “There we go, we can’t celebrate a successful mission without the whole team.”

“Speaking of which, how’d it go over there?” Torbjörn asked.

Jesse shrugged. “Oh you know, about like usual. All according to plan.” He took a drink before adding, “Until we started executing the plan, anyways.” The comment drew a round of knowing laughs from the group, and Angela found herself laughing with the rest of them. Even after a week in Gibraltar, she still could not help but smile at seeing her old friends like this, no matter her misgivings over the reasons behind the gathering.

“‘No battle plan survives contact with the enemy,’” Jack quoted, earning an ostentatious eye roll from Jesse.

“I’d say it all worked out alright, though. Thanks to Fareeha here.” Jesse nodded and tipped his hat in her direction.

Angela thought she saw faint color rising in Fareeha’s cheeks. “Please,” she said, “I just did my part.”

“If you say so, but ‘your part’ saved my ass, so I’m gonna drink to you anyway.” Jesse raised his bottle to Fareeha before downing the last third of it in one go.

Angela gave Fareeha a playful nudge with her shoulder, or tried to anyway; it felt a bit like nudging a brick wall. “Anything you did to make my job easier earns my thanks, certainly.” She chose to overlook the gauze bandage wrapped around Fareeha’s left arm for now.

“Yep, first mission out with us, and she takes on Widowmaker.”

Angela only half heard Jesse’s story, her attention on Lena as she watched her set her beer down and quietly slip out of her seat. Angela caught Lena’s hand as she passed behind her on the way to the door. “Lena? Are you alright?” It was not like her to skip out on a party.

Lena looked at Angela for a moment before responding. “Sure, love, just tired is all,” she answered.

Angela was skeptical and considered pressing further, but opted not to. “You’d best get some rest then. Ask Athena to page me if you need?”

Lena gave her a wry look. “Yes, mum.”

 

The electric motor of the hover-bike thrummed beneath Lena as she zipped north along the A-7 at something approaching twice the legal limit, the road still all but empty in the middle of the night. She shifted her weight, leaning into the quick turns to cut across one of the road’s many roundabouts. She was very familiar with the road that ran along the Spanish coast, enough so that she could drive it without thinking. It was one of the early legs of her favorite route out of Watchpoint: Gibraltar, one she had ridden just about every time she’d had leave when she had been stationed there. Fourteen hours from base to the French border - according to the satnav; it was only nine if she rode the way she usually did. It wasn’t the fastest route, but she’d always preferred the view of the open sea to endless farmland or encroaching forest. From the border she would continue on into France. _And that’s exactly what I_ don’t _want to think about right now, thanks._ She tried to focus on the here and now: the shifting vibrations of the bike as it negotiated the turns, the feel of the wind whipping against her jacket where it wasn’t held tight beneath her harness, and the scent of the sea that it carried with it, but these just brought her back to her past trips along this road, back when she could find elation in the way sea and sky blurred together at the horizon just enough that Lena could for a time imagine it to be the endless blue found at 45,000 feet, her anticipation and excitement growing with every mile traveled as she flew toward her destination.

She hadn’t lied to Angela; she _was_ tired. Tired of hearing the rest of them talk about Amélie as if she were any other enemy of theirs, anonymous and unambiguously evil. Tired of torturously brief encounters with her, never long enough for Lena to learn anything that might let her help her. Tired of having to carry on as if there’s nothing wrong since apparently that’s what everyone’s decided to do. _Must’ve missed the vote on that one._

Abruptly Lena jerked hard on the bike’s controls, ignoring the screaming warnings on the holo dash as she jumped the guardrail and streaked over rocks and shrubs, finally bringing the bike to a stop along the sandy beach. She yanked her goggles up hard enough that they missed her forehead and flew off into the sand below her, and scrubbed at her eyes. _Damn it. I should’ve ridden to Cádiz…too much history on this road._ Fourteen - or nine - to the border, three more to Lyon. Or six to Paris, if that was where Amélie was performing that week. She pounded her bike’s steering column, letting out a scream that turned into choking sobs. She had tried, oh _God_ had she tried to forget. Move on. Be like the others - had Jack even blinked when the topic came up during the debrief? Jack, Jesse, Angela…none of them seemed to care. Of course, none of them had been as close to Amélie as Lena had; she wondered bitterly how Angela or Jack would have reacted if it had been Ana’s voice threatening her life, Ana’s eyes coldly staring her down through a rifle scope.

She slumped over the handlebars, shoulders shaking as she cried. God, she missed Amélie. She missed the way she would lean in to speak to Lena, their faces inches apart, every whispered conversation taking on a sense of conspiracy and mystery. She missed the way she would crinkle her nose and snort trying not to laugh at some crass joke Lena had just made. She missed the casual touches on her hand, her shoulder, her knee - and the not-so-casual touches - the soft trace of delicate fingers against her skin, the press of her lips, the warmth of her body beneath her - when Gérard was a thousand miles away on a mission and Lena could pretend that Amélie was hers and hers alone.

Gradually Lena’s tears subsided, leaving her sniffling and catching her breath. She gave the handlebars another frustrated shove and the bike rocked under her, the repulsors whining sharply as they worked to counter the force; a flashing overbalance warning served as a protest to her action. Lena sighed and patted the bike’s battery enclosure apologetically. “You didn’t deserve that, now did you, hon?” She patted it once more for good measure before climbing off to sit in the sand, her back against the bike, watching the waves crash into the rocks just offshore. How could she let Amélie go when she wasn’t really gone, when she keeps meeting her on the battlefield? Granted, she was fighting for the wrong side, and there was no telling what sort of horrible things Talon had put her through, but it couldn’t be anything that they couldn’t fix. Underneath all the brainwashing she was still the same person, the same Amélie. She _had_ to be.

 

She scanned the moonlit room once more, rifle raised and ready; there was little enough to see - and even less that an assailant could conceal themselves behind - but she had been trained to be cautious above all else. Caution kept her alive, and staying alive kept her useful. The front door to the small, one room apartment remained barred just as it had been when she had left, and the room’s scant furnishings appeared undisturbed. She slid the balcony door shut, drawing the curtains closed silently, and gave the bathroom a quick check before settling herself on the small bed in the corner and activating her communicator, finally satisfied that she was alone. Nevertheless her rifle she propped against the wall, well within arm’s reach - caution. As soon as her communicator indicated readiness, she sent the standard message: _’Agent 216 341 Widowmaker reporting.’_

She laid back on the bed and stretched, getting comfortable while she awaited her operator’s response. The room’s sole source of illumination - a ceiling fixture whose shade had been long since been broken or lost, assuming it ever had one to begin with - hung from the center of the room, a single bare bulb shining overly bright. She shut her eyes against the irritating flicker and buzz of cheap LEDs, leaving her with its afterimage: a glowing spot hanging in the darkness.

_Like a stage light in a theatre._

_Or a spotlight shining down in the night sky._

Trés dramatique.

She immediately rolled her eyes at the comparison, which only resulted in her being blinded once again. She shifted onto her side with a sigh, frustrated more by her own thoughts than the light fixture. Every spare moment she’d had since Juárez had found her mind returning to that night. And that woman. Three times now she had shown up to make a nuisance of herself. _Twice that I could have ended her, and did not._ On the rooftops in King’s Row, it had been a tactical decision; she had achieved her objective, and any delay put her at greater risk of capture. Juárez had simply been a mistake. She had thought she’d had the girl cornered, but that damnable device of hers… _But you know well by now what it does, and what she is capable of._ She should have taken the shot, instead of trying to interrogate her. It had been a mistake, she accepted that; it was not her first, and it would not be her last. Despite the resources Talon had invested in her, she was not infallible. _You should be able to let this go._

The communicator in her hand beeped with her operator’s response, pulling her out of her thoughts. _’Acknowledged, Widowmaker. Location and status?’_ Clear and concise as always.

She sat back up to focus on her report. _’Mexico City. Primary objectives achieved. Awaiting further orders.’_ She hesitated a moment before adding, _’Shall I pursue my lead on the infiltrators?’_

_’Negative. We know their identity and location. They will be dealt with in due time.’_

_’Understood.’_ ‘Dealt with,’ as she should have done with Tracer.

Tracer. The alias called to mind a stream of details: Lena Oxton; 26 years old; born in Enfield Provisional Residence Camp, United Kingdom; broke her arm jumping off a rooftop at age 5; giggles when she is happy, nervous, or aroused; experienced chronal dissociation event at age 18; hates the smell of strawberries; twitches in her sleep. The list went on and on - part Talon dossier, part foraged memories from the life of a dead woman - yet nothing within it helped explain why she had not executed the girl, as she had countless others.

Her communicator’s flashing screen caught her attention. _’Repeat: Agent, what is your condition?’_

She had missed the initial query, lost in her thoughts as she had been. Her answer came automatically. _’Ready for action. Awaiting orders.’_

_’Confirm status: Ready for action.’_

The question was unexpected - off from the usual script. Still she answered automatically. _’Confirmed.’_

_’No anomalies to report?’_

The follow up gave her pause. The way her thoughts kept returning to that night… Did that constitute an ‘anomaly?’ She had certainly never found herself so preoccupied by a previous mission before now. Still, it had not interfered with her focus in the field, and had not hindered her in her work; eliminating Lena Oxton had never been part of her mission objectives. Reporting her errant thoughts as an anomaly would almost certainly result in orders to come in for reconditioning. And that would mean having to wait that much longer before her next assignment. Time wasted when she could be serving a purpose in the field. _’Negative. No anomalies to report.’_

There was an overly long pause and she wondered for a moment if her operator disbelieved her, but their eventual reply alleviated her concern. _’Acknowledged. Transmitting new orders now. Review and prepare for extraction.’_

She opened the file that had just arrived on her communicator and scanned over the mission briefing, a smile creeping across her lips, all thoughts of the recent past finally pushed aside in favor of anticipation for what was to come.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _Shows up six months late with a new chapter and Starbucks. >.>_
> 
> #### Translation Notes
> 
> _Trés dramatique_
>      (French) Very dramatic.


End file.
